Back to Design and Technologies
What are the Technologies contexts in Design and Technologies?
There are four Technologies contexts that are studied in Design and Technologies:
- Engineering principles and systems
- Food and fibre production
- Food specialisations
- Materials and technologies specialisations
The Technologies Contexts strand focuses on the characteristics and properties for each context, and how they can be used to create innovative designed-solutions. Contexts can be studied individually or together, for example, Food and fibre production and Food specialisation could be studied together.
Where does Home Economics (Food) fit within the Victorian Curriculum?
Elements of learning in home economics will draw from content in both Health and Physical Education and Design Technologies in the Victorian Curriculum.
Content drawn from the Health and Physical Education curriculum is in relation to food and nutrition. Students develop the knowledge to make healthy choices about food and nutrition and explore the range of influences on these choices and build the skills to access and assess nutritional information that can support healthy choices.
Content from the Design and Technologies curriculum is drawn from the food specialisation context. Students learn how to apply knowledge of the characteristics and scientific and sensory principles of food, along with the nutrition principles described in Health and Physical Education, to food selection and preparation. They do this through the design and preparation of food for specific purposes and consumers.
In the Victorian Curriculum F–10, content related to healthy eating features in both
Design and Technologies and Health and Physical Education curriculum areas. When teaching about healthy eating, these two curriculum areas can be used to complement each other.
Do I have to teach Design and Technologies every year and what are the reporting implications?
Schools will develop their whole-school curriculum plan in order to deliver the Victorian Curriculum F-10 in a way that is meaningful and relevant to their students. It is, therefore, a school-based decision as to when and how the Design and Technologies curriculum is delivered. For example, schools may choose to deliver a concentrated unit of work to Year 3 students in Semester 1 to align with harvesting fresh food from the school garden and in Semester 2 an integrated unit on Machines, and then not teach any component of the Design and Technologies curriculum to students in Year 4.
Schools will report student progress along the continuum when it has been taught. For example, if the concentrated unit is taught to Year 3 students in Semester 1, then this will be included in the half yearly Year 3 report accurately representing the level of achievement, and will also be reported in Semester 2 as another unit was taught and assessed.